RE: Quantifying the value of customer support

["Siegel, David" <David.Siegel () Level3 com>]

There is no such thing as a generic business case that can be applied across all companies in an industry.  Every 
business is unique in its product definition and organization structure, but each question is also unique and therefore 
the analysis must be done every time.

The way to begin is to ask this manager what he believes the possible outcomes are (downsize your group, eliminate your 
group, re-define your group, etc.) and then work with each of the key stakeholders that you have to estimate the impact 
of those outcomes.  For example, if 1st line operations indicates that eliminating your group would result in decreased 
customer satisfaction and missed SLA's, ask them to quantify it as much as possible and go to take the numbers back to 
your business people to have them estimate the impact on revenue.

The analysis should be constructed and presented in standard finance terms (like NPV) so I would suggest that you make 
friends with someone in finance to assist you with the preparation.  You can also take a short two-day course like this 
http://executive.mit.edu/openenrollment/program/fundamentals_of_finance_for_the_technical_executive/16 that will teach 
you how to build up these analysis yourself (I have taken the one referenced and I recommend it to all managers with 
budget responsibility).

The outcome from these discussions often has surprising but positive outcomes for everyone...maintaining the status quo 
is not always the best possible outcome despite the biases we usually have when we begin the analysis.  :-)  If you 
work closely with all of your stakeholders, everyone will learn and benefit from the experience.

Dave

-----Original Message-----
From: Kasper Adel [mailto:karim.adel () gmail com] 
Sent: Thursday, February 14, 2013 2:16 PM
To: Andrew Latham
Cc: NANOG list
Subject: Re: Quantifying the value of customer support

I used to think that these kind of situations take place when a manager was never an engineer so he does not understand 
how things work but i was surprised when i faced these from managers with an intense engineering career so i gave up on 
trying to give conceptual excuses and want to just give them the dump tables and numbers that they are looking for.

Kim

On Thursday, February 14, 2013, Andrew Latham wrote:

> On Thu, Feb 14, 2013 at 3:52 PM, Kasper Adel 
> <karim.adel () gmail com<javascript:;>>
> wrote:
> > Hello,
> >
> > We are a 2nd level of escalation in a service provider, trying to 
> > put a $ value on the support we give to our NOC and other 
> > implementation teams, when they email us about problems they face. 
> > But we are merely bits and bytes engineers that cant quantify and 
> > justify the value of what we do to the management team. I guess 
> > these smart suits want to see an excel sheet with a table of how 
> > much they save or gain by the support we do. We
> respond
> > to technical questions and simulate problems in a lab.
> >
> > Can anyone help me with an idea or any material i can reuse? Templates?
> Has
> > any one been in a similar situation.
> >
> > Thanks
> > Kim
>
> Kasper/Karim/Kim
>
> Your job is customer retention.  Your value is maintaining all company 
> income.  Write the yearly revenue on a piece of paper and hand it to 
> them.
>
>
> --
> ~ Andrew "lathama" Latham lathama () gmail com <javascript:;> 
> http://lathama.net ~